Sea Floor Spreading And Plate Tectonics

Theory of plate tectonics.

Sea floor spreading and plate tectonics.

In 1967 mckenzie and parker suggested the theory of plate tectonics. Morgan later outlined the theory in 1968. Plate tectonics plate tectonics seafloor spreading. When oceanic plates diverge tensional stress causes fractures to occur in the lithosphere.

Subduction happens where tectonic plates crash into each other instead of spreading apart. 1 demonstration of the ruggedness and youth of the ocean floor. In particular four major scientific developments spurred the formulation of the plate tectonics theory. These age data also allow the rate of seafloor spreading to be.

According to the theory of plate tectonics the earth s lithosphere is broken into distinct plates which are. The denser lithospheric material then melts back into the earth s mantle. By 1968 on the basis of these details and a variety of other evidence the theory of plate tectonics as it had become. The continents are embedded in the thicker lithospheric plates carried along by the action of seafloor spreading.

When the concept of seafloor spreading came along scientists recognized that it was the mechanism to explain how continents could move around earth s surface. Plate tectonics by combining the sea floor spreading theory with continental drift and information on global seismicity the new theory of plate tectonics became a coherent theory to explain crustal movements. Plates are composed of lithosphere about 100 km thick that float on the ductile asthenosphere. Seafloor spreading theory that oceanic crust forms along submarine mountain zones and spreads out laterally away from them.

The motivating force for seafloor spreading ridges is tectonic plate slab pull at subduction zones rather than magma pressure although there is typically. Seafloor spreading helps to explain continental drift in the theory of plate tectonics. 2 confirmation of repeated reversals of the earth magnetic field in the geologic past. Samples collected from the ocean floor show that the age of oceanic crust increases with distance from the spreading centre important evidence in favour of this process.

It is not just the continents that are drifting. Seafloor spreading is just one part of plate tectonics. At subduction zones the edge of the denser plate subducts or slides beneath the less dense one. 3 emergence of the seafloor spreading hypothesis and associated recycling of oceanic.

As upwelling of magma continues the plates continue to diverge a process known as seafloor spreading. Theory of plate tectonics upsc ias.